This week Leicester Tigers’ George Chuter won the honour of becoming Tap and Go’s first member of the front row brethren to come under questioning.

George, how goes it?
Very well thanks Tap and Go.

Tap and Go isn’t surprised given Leicester’s run into the Guinness Premiership final. You must have thought you weren’t going to make it this time last month?
If I’m honest, probably not. With ten minutes to go in the Harlequins game we were seventh and right out of the running. Our main focus at that time was to get into the top five or six and qualify for the Heineken Cup let alone the playoffs. But London Irish did us a favour at Sale and we sneaked in. Once you’re in there we, of all clubs, know what can happen, anyone can win and the form book counts for very little.

Even your forwards coach Richard Cockerill wrote you off. Did you know he was an expert in reverse psychology?
A few of the lads were a bit surprised he said that, but it doesn’t really matter what everyone else says. What matters is what the attitude is of the team that goes on the field. Once we had Quins in front of us we knew we needed to win with a bonus point and we did that, then once we qualified, it doesn’t matter what anyone else thinks either because it’s one game to get into the final regardless of what’s happened all year. That was the attitude we took to Gloucester and it worked for us.

And presumably you bought Andy Goode a few light ales on Sunday night after his winning drop goal?
Yeah we had a few scoops! We had a team social on the Monday as well with one of our physios leaving so it tied in quite nicely with celebrating getting into the final - it became quite a drawn out celebration!

Tap and Go can imagine. Given the luck you’ve had in recent weeks, will you be keeping up any pre-match superstitions before the final?
No I’ve never been into those at all. I know lots of guys have to wear the same pants and put the same boot on first but I’ve never been like that at all, bit of a boring answer for you.

Fair enough. It’s off to North America for you with the Saxons this summer. As one of the tour’s elder statesmen, will you be passing on any words of wisdom to the younger guys?
I might have to get a thesaurus out for that!

Disappointed not to have made the full tour to New Zealand?
I spoke to Johnno and he told me before he announced the squad that he was going to go with the other guys on the main tour and he asked me if I wanted to go to the Churchill Cup. He made it clear it wouldn’t count against me if I didn’t want to go, but I told him I’d love to go because I haven’t played a lot of rugby this year so I’m fresh, I don’t need a break and it’s a great tour to go on. It’s a good chance for me to keep my hat in the ring with England and the tournament itself is a great competition, and we’ve got a good chance of winning it with the squad we’ve got.

What’s your post match tipple?
Lucozade, (cough, cough,…). No, I’m a Jack Daniels man, anything Jack.

Even if the coaches are watching?
I don’t care if they’re watching, I’m an adult, I can do what I like.

That’s the spirit, George. Tap and Go’s in an end-of-season generous mood. If we could take you anywhere on holiday, where to?
I’ve got two kids and we took them to Disney World in Florida last year and I think I enjoyed it more than they did. I had a great time. Initially I thought: ‘two weeks, Disney, summer, it’ll be too busy, it’ll be horrible’, but I got out there and I couldn’t get enough of it! So I’d probably go out there again

And what if we could whisk you off to any sporting event of your choice?
I’m a pretty big fan of American sports. I’d love to go to the Super Bowl, it’s always been an ambition of mine. I watch loads of American football and the Super Bowl is an amazing spectacle. But at the moment I’m watching a lot of the NBA and there have been some cracking games in the play-offs there so perhaps one of the big basketball play-off finals.

Are you as much of a Gridiron nut as Johnno?
Yeah I’m afraid I am almost as geeky as him. Not quite on the same level but there or thereabouts.

OK, wind up time, can you share a dressing room prank with us?
Erm, just trying to think of a clean one….Oh Lewis Moody, Martin Castrogiovanni and Seru Rabeni have had a bit of a running battle this year. It all stems from some sort of imagined insult. Seru nicked one of Lewis’s boots and thought that was really funny, so Lewis went into the physio room and got about five rolls of tape and taped up all of Seru’s kit: clothes, shoes, keys, just taped everything up into small balls. So Seru spent about three hours trying to unpick everything. So while Lewis was out training or having an operation or whatever it was he was doing that week, Seru went and tied knots in all his clothes. Then Castro was on the outside of all this and started playing them off against each other by cutting holes in Lewis’s socks and stealing Seru’s laces. It all snowballed out of control and it got to the stage where everyone was going into the changing room and packing all their own clothes away. Nothing was safe.

What’s all that writing about on Castro’s strapping?
It’s all quite innocent. It’s his friend’s two children’s names, his mum’s name, all just a tribute to people close to him, nothing mysterious.

A nice touch from the big man. Who would be your three ideal dinner guests?
Oooooh….well, I’m not sure whether to be serious or not…. I’d invite Kylie Minogue. Erm… Can it just be me and Kylie? I’m very hungry so I’ll eat for three.

Dinner for two with Kylie sounds delightful. If it’s just you and her you can have a celebrity chef to cook if you like.
No I’d probably just get a takeaway or something. I’m not too extravagant, a pizza’ll do.

Like your style. What’s the best thing about being a professional rugby player?
I think just winning trophies and big games. When you’ve got a big quarter or semi final, you’ve really worked hard to prepare and you’re sitting there in the changing room absolutely knackered but you’ve won: it’s an amazing feeling but hard to describe: relief, elation, joy all rolled into one. It makes all the hard work in the summer, slogging your way round the running track, lifting weights, it makes it all worthwhile when you get a win under your belt in a big game.

And the worst?
Probably the opposite, when you lose. All players and teams work hard and someone has to lose, but it’s a really empty feeling, especially losing in a final. You’ve won some big games to get there and suddenly when you lose – it’s terrible actually. You just want to ground to open up and swallow you.

What will George Chuter be doing when he hangs up his boots?
I don’t know to be honest. I must say I’ve not got any burning ambition to be a coach. It’s not something I think I’d enjoy, not having that control. When you’re a player you’ve got an influence over the game, you can make things happen on a Saturday, whereas with a coach all your work’s done Monday to Friday, then you’re a spectator and it must be very frustrating when things aren’t going well and there’s nothing you can do. I don’t think that would suit me.
I wouldn’t mind working in some sort of development job, working with young players coming through, or on the admin side of rugby rather than the playing side.

Who was your favourite player as a lad?
Dean Richards. I didn’t watch a lot of rugby and didn’t really get into it ‘til I was about 12 or 13 and at that time he was playing for England and he was a huge figure - literally and metaphorically - in the game. You watched him on TV and the ball used to be in his hands all the time it seemed.

Thanks George, good luck next weekend.
Cheers mate.

George and the Leicester Tigers squad use MET-Rx sports nutrition products as part of their training programme. For more information about MET-Rx visit www.metrx.co.uk